Help others like me, says Chisty

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Last Updated: Wed, Dec 12, 2012 16:00 hrs

New Delhi, Dec 12 (IANS) "Something should be done to reduce...human sufferings," Pakistani doctor Mohammad Khalil Chisty, a life convict set free by the Supreme Court in a 1992 murder case, Wednesday said seeking help for other convicts like him in both countries.

"In my opinion the justice system in our countries (India and Pakistan) is a lengthy process...something should be done to reduce the time (involved in deciding the cases) and to check the human sufferings," he said, after the court allowed him to return to his country.

"I am, by training and birth, a Muslim who believes in the supremacy of Allah and Allah will not let me down," he said.

He wished that the people of India and Pakistan should "live in a friendly manner and minor differences should not make them forget that once they were related to each other".

Besides going back to Karachi, Chisty is also looking forward to revisiting Ajmer. "Yes I will (come again). Don't forget it (Ajmer) is my birth place," said the octogenarian.

Chisty said that all through his five-month stay in Pakistan, allowed during the pendency of his petition before the apex court, he was "haunted by the prospects of the worst", if things did not go in his favour in the hearing of his appeal against the life sentence given to him for a murder he committed in Rajasthan.

On being told that he had not been acquitted but his conviction and sentence had been modified, Chisty said: "I don't know what legal terminology is. As an ordinary person, I believe in result and not procedure."

Saying that he would not have a hitch in coming back to India, Chisty said right now he just wanted to get back to his home in Karachi and spend some time with his family and his grand-children.

On going back to the shrine of Sufi saint Hazrat Khwaja Moinuddin Chisty in Ajmer, near which the murder took place, he said: "It is not the place that matters. The place is a piece of land and bricks. I belong to him (saint). He is a mediator between us and the God."

Chisty praised his wife Mehrunisa who not only shouldered the burden of his family in the last 20 years but also arranged money for his bail.

The man who waged a two-decade legal battle overcame two heart attacks and a hip fracture during the period.